The structure and authority of Germany’s government are derived from the country’s constitution, the Grundgesetz (Basic Law), which went into force on May 23, 1949, after formal consent to the establishment of the Federal Republic (then known as West Germany) had been given by the military governments of the Western occupying powers (France, the United Kingdom, and the United States) and upon the assent of the parliaments of the Länder (states) to form the Bund (federation). West Germany then comprised 11 states and West Berlin, which was given the special status of a state without voting rights. As a provisional solution until an anticipated reunification with the eastern sector, the capital was located in the small university town of Bonn. On October 7, 1949, the Soviet zone of occupation was transformed into a separate, nominally sovereign country (if under Soviet hegemony), known formally as the German Democratic Republic (and popularly as East Germany). The five federal states within the Soviet zone were abolished and reorganized into 15 administrative districts (Bezirke), of which the Soviet sector of Berlin became the capital.

Full sovereignty was achieved only gradually in West Germany; many powers and prerogatives, including those of direct intervention, were retained by the Western powers and devolved to the West German government only as it was able to become economically and politically stable. West Germany finally achieved full sovereignty on May 5, 1955.

East Germany regarded its separation from the rest of Germany as complete, but West Germany considered its eastern neighbour as an illegally constituted state until the 1970s, when the doctrine of “two German states in one German nation” was developed. Gradual rapprochements between the two governments helped regularize the anomalous situation, especially concerning travel, transportation, and the status of West Berlin as an exclave of the Federal Republic.

As a condition for unification and its integration into the Federal Republic, East Germany was required to reconstitute the five historical states of Brandenburg, Mecklenburg–West Pomerania, Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia. As states of the united Germany, they adopted administrative, judicial, educational, and social structures parallel and analogous to those in the states of former West Germany. East and West Berlin were reunited and now form a single state.

With the country’s unification on October 3, 1990, all vestiges of the Federal Republic’s qualified status as a sovereign state were voided. For example, Berlin was no longer technically occupied territory, with ultimate authority vested in the military governors.

Germany’s constitution established a parliamentary system of government that incorporated many features of the British system; however, since the Basic Law created a federal system, unlike the United Kingdom’s unitary one, many political structures were drawn from the models of the United States and other federal governments. In reaction to the centralization of power during the Nazi era, the Basic Law granted the states considerable autonomy. In addition to federalism, the Basic Law has two other features similar to the Constitution of the United States: (1) its formal declaration of the principles of human rights and of bases for the government of the people and (2) the strongly independent position of the courts, especially in the right of the Federal Constitutional Court to void a law by declaring it unconstitutional.

The formal chief of state is the president. Intended to be an elder statesman of stature, the president is chosen for a five-year term by a specially convened assembly. In addition to formally signing all federal legislation and treaties, the president nominates the federal chancellor and the chancellor’s cabinet appointments, whom the president may dismiss upon the chancellor’s recommendation. However, the president cannot dismiss either the federal chancellor or the Bundestag (Federal Diet), the lower chamber of the federal parliament. Among other important presidential functions are those of appointing federal judges and certain other officials and the right of pardon and reprieve.

The government is headed by the chancellor, who is elected by a majority vote of the Bundestag upon nomination by the president. Vested with considerable independent powers, the chancellor is responsible for initiating government policy. The cabinet and its ministries also enjoy extensive autonomy and powers of initiative. The chancellor can be deposed only by an absolute majority of the Bundestag and only after a majority has been assured for the election of a successor. This “constructive vote of no confidence”—in contrast to the vote of no confidence employed in most other parliamentary systems, which only require a majority opposed to the sitting prime minister for ouster—reduces the likelihood that the chancellor will be unseated. Indeed, the constructive vote of no confidence has been used only once to remove a chancellor from office (in 1982 Helmut Schmidt was defeated on such a motion and replaced with Helmut Kohl). The cabinet may not be dismissed by a vote of no confidence by the Bundestag. The president may not unseat a government or, in a crisis, call upon a political leader at his discretion to form a new government. The latter constitutional provision is based on the experience of the sequence of events whereby Adolf Hitler became chancellor in 1933.

Most cabinet officials are members of the Bundestag and are drawn from the majority party or proportionally from the parties forming a coalition, but the chancellor may appoint persons without party affiliation but with a certain area of technical competence. These nondelegate members speak or answer questions during parliamentary debates.

The Bundestag, which consists of about 600 members (the precise number of members varies depending on election results), is the cornerstone of the German system of government. It exercises much wider powers than the 69-member upper chamber, known as the Bundesrat (Federal Council). Bundesrat delegations represent the interests of the state governments and are bound to vote unanimously as instructed by their provincial governments. All legislation originates in the Bundestag; the consent of the Bundesrat is necessary only on certain matters directly affecting the interests of the states, especially in the area of finance and administration and for legislation in which questions of the Basic Law are involved. It may restrain the Bundestag by rejecting certain routine legislation passed by the lower chamber; unless a bill falls within certain categories that enable the Bundesrat to exercise an absolute veto over legislation, its vote against a bill may be overridden by a simple majority in the Bundestag, or by a two-thirds majority in the Bundestag should there be a two-thirds majority opposed in the Bundesrat. To amend the Basic Law, approval by a two-thirds vote in each chamber is required.

The powers of the Bundestag are kept in careful balance with those of the Landtage, the state parliaments. Certain powers are specifically reserved to the republic—for example, foreign affairs, defense, post and telecommunications, customs, international trade, and matters affecting citizenship. The Bundestag and the states may pass concurrent legislation in such matters when it is necessary and desirable, or the Bundestag may set out certain guidelines for legislation; drawing from these, each individual Landtag may enact legislation in keeping with its own needs and circumstances. In principle, the Bundestag initiates or approves legislation in matters in which uniformity is essential, but the Landtage otherwise are free to act in areas in which they are not expressly restrained by the Basic Law.

Regional and local government

Certain functions (e.g., education and law enforcement) are expressly the responsibility of the states, yet there is an attempt to maintain a degree of uniformity among the 16 states through joint consultative bodies. The state governments are generally parallel in structure to that of the Bund but need not be. In 13 states the head of government has a cabinet and ministers; each of these states also has its own parliamentary body. In the city-states of Hamburg, Bremen, and Berlin, the mayor serves simultaneously as the head of the city government and the state government. In the city-states the municipal senates serve also as provincial parliaments, and the municipal offices assume the nature of provincial ministries.

The administrative subdivisions of the states (exclusive of the city-states and the Saarland) are the Regierungsbezirke (administrative districts). Below these are the divisions known as Kreise (counties). Larger communities enjoy the status of what in the United Kingdom was formerly the county borough. The counties themselves are further subdivided into the Gemeinden (roughly “communities” or “parishes”), which through long German tradition have achieved considerable autonomy and responsibility in the administration of schools, hospitals, housing and construction, social welfare, public services and utilities, and cultural amenities. Voters may pass laws on certain issues via referenda at the municipal and state levels.

Justice

The German court system differs from that of some other federations, such as the United States, in that all the trial and appellate courts are state courts while the courts of last resort are federal. All courts may hear cases based on law enacted on the federal level, though there are some areas of law over which the states have exclusive control. The federal courts assure the uniform application of national law by the state courts. In addition to the courts of general jurisdiction for civil and criminal cases, the highest of which is the Federal Court of Justice, there are four court systems with specialized jurisdiction in administrative, labour, social security, and tax matters. The jurisdiction of the three-level system of administrative courts extends, for example, to all civil law litigation of a nonconstitutional nature unless other specialized courts have jurisdiction.

Although all courts have the power and the obligation to review the constitutionality of government action and legislation within their jurisdiction, only the Federal Constitutional Court (Bundesverfassungsgericht) in Karlsruhe may declare legislation unconstitutional. Other courts must suspend proceedings if they find a statute unconstitutional and must submit the question of constitutionality to the Federal Constitutional Court. In serious criminal cases the trial courts sit with lay judges, similar to jurors, who are chosen by lot from a predetermined list. The lay judges decide all questions of guilt and punishment jointly with the professional judges. Lay judges also participate in some noncriminal matters.

Judges on the Federal Constitutional Court are chosen for nonrenewable 12-year terms. The Bundestag and Bundesrat each select half of the court’s 16 judges; in each case, a nominee must win two-thirds support to secure appointment. The court sits in two eight-member Senates, which handle ordinary cases. Important cases are decided by the entire body.

Judges play a more prominent and active role in all stages of legal proceedings than do their common-law counterparts, and proceedings in German courts tend to be less controlled by prosecutors and defense attorneys. There is less emphasis on formal rules of evidence, which in the common-law countries is largely a by-product of the jury system, and more stress on letting the facts speak for what they may be worth in the individual case. There is no plea bargaining in criminal cases. In Germany, as in most European countries, litigation costs are relatively low compared with those in the United States, but the losing party in any case usually must pay the court costs and attorney fees of both parties.

Although codes and statutes are viewed as the primary source of law in Germany, precedent is of great importance in the interpretation of legal rules. German administrative law, for example, is case law in the same sense that there exists no codification of the principles relied upon in the process of reviewing administrative action. These principles are mostly the law as determined by previous judicial rulings. Germans see their system of judicial review of administrative actions as implementation of the rule of law. In this context an emphasis is placed on the availability of judicial remedies.

Unification brought about the integration and adaptation of the administration of justice of East and West Germany; however, this was complicated by the large number of judges who were incapacitated by the union. Many judges were dismissed either because they owed their appointment as judges primarily to their loyalty to the communist government or because of their records. To fill the many vacancies created in the courts of the new states, judges and judicial administrators were recruited from former West Germany. Indeed, a large number were “put on loan” from the western states and many others urged out of retirement to help during the transition.

Political process

The electorate

National elections to the Bundestag are held once every four years. All German citizens at least age 18 are eligible to vote (this was reduced from age 21 in 1970). The Basic Law established a mixed electoral system, consisting of elements of both plurality and proportionality. Half of the Bundestag’s members are elected to represent single-seat constituencies, and half are elected through proportional representation. Voters cast two ballots. Constituency representatives are elected by the distribution of votes on the first ballot; the candidate winning the most votes secures election to the Bundestag. Voters cast ballots for political parties at the regional level with their second vote (Zweitstimme), which determines overall party representation. A party must win at least 5 percent of the national vote (or win at least three constituencies) to secure representation, and the number of seats it is allocated is based on its proportion of second votes. The system is designed to simultaneously provide a link between citizens and elected representatives and a legislature that reflects a consensus of opinions in the country. Bundesrat members are appointed by the state governments, and the body exercises its authority to protect the rights and prerogatives of the state governments. Each state is allocated between three and six members of the Bundesrat, depending on population.

The quadrennial general and provincial elections as well as local elections are attended with the greatest interest and involvement by the electorate. The public is kept informed on political issues through intense media coverage, and political affairs are frequently debated among German citizens. Although voting is not compulsory, the participation rate is high, with about three-fourths of eligible voters casting ballots. Since elections in the states are staggered throughout the life of each Bundestag, they act as a bellwether of public opinion for the incumbent federal government. German citizens, along with German residents who are citizens of other EU countries, also elect representatives to the European Parliament.

Political parties

The sheer proliferation of Germany’s political parties contributed to the downfall of the Weimar Republic in 1933, but they have shown an increasing tendency toward consolidation since the early days of the Federal Republic. Smaller parties generally either have allied themselves with the larger ones, have shrunk into insignificance, or simply have vanished. Reunified Germany has, in effect, only two numerically major parties, the Christian Democratic Union (Christlich-Demokratische Union; CDU) and the Social Democratic Party of Germany (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands; SPD), neither of which can easily attain a parliamentary majority. In addition, there are four numerically small but important parties: the Christian Social Union (Christlich-Soziale Union; CSU), the Bavarian sister party of the CDU; the Free Democratic Party (FDP), which has served as a junior coalition partner in most German governments since World War II; Alliance ’90/The Greens (Bündnis ’90/Die Grünen), a party formed in 1993 by the merger of the ecologist Green Party and the eastern German Alliance ’90; and the Left Party, formerly the Party of Democratic Socialism (Partei des Demokratischen Sozialismus; PDS), the successor of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED), which later allied itself with left groups in western Germany. Fringe political parties, such as The Republicans (Die Republikaner) and the German People’s Union (Deutsche Volksunion; DVU), have scored some limited success at the local and state levels but have not won representation at the national level. The 5 percent threshold for elections has proved a highly effective instrument in excluding radical parties of whatever stripe and in preventing the formation of splinter parties. However, the proportional element of the electoral system has necessitated the formation of coalition governments. Since 1966 all federal governments have been composed of at least two parties. Dissent within the major parties is contained in the wings and factions of each respective party.

The Christian Democratic parties

The CDU is a centre-right party that endorses conservative social values and the social market economy. In government for much of Germany’s post-World War II history, it headed governments from 1949 to 1966 and from 1982 to 1998 (in alliance with the FDP and CSU); it returned to power in 2005 in a coalition with the CSU and the SPD. Beginning in 2009, the CDU headed a new coalition with the CSU and the FDP. The CDU is a successor of the old Catholic Centre Party and kindred bourgeois parties, either Protestant or nonsectarian. In a country in which one’s religion often determined one’s politics, the party’s strongest constituencies are still in the Roman Catholic districts, although the sectarian Christian aspect is of only incidental emphasis, chiefly among older voters. The party strongly endorses Germany’s leading role in the EU, its membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), a free market economy, and vigorous material assistance to the countries of the former communist bloc, especially the onetime Soviet republics. It is established in all states except Bavaria, where the more conservative CSU functions as its counterpart in effectively a permanent coalition.

A branch of the CDU (known as CDU-Ost) existed in East Germany throughout that country’s history. However, it was only tolerated to preserve the facade of a multiparty system. With the overthrow of the ruling communist regime in East Germany’s first free elections, on March 18, 1990, it was this rump party that took power by a large mandate, with Lothar de Maizière as minister president presiding over the six-month transitional period to unification.

The Social Democrats

The SPD, in government from 1966 to 1982 (1966–69 with the CDU and 1969–82 with the FDP) and from 1998 to 2009 (1998–2005 with the Greens and 2005–09 with the CDU-CSU), is the heir to the Marxist parties of the 19th century. In East Germany, which historically was the stronghold of the socialist movement in Germany, the SPD was subsumed by the formation of the SED in 1946. Ostensibly a combination of the old Communist Party of Germany (Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands; KPD) and the Socialist Party, the SED was in fact simply the ruling communist party. In West Germany the SPD’s early postwar leadership, drawing strength from its record of opposition to Nazism, adhered to a rigorously orthodox Marxism, opposed vehemently the communist movement from which it had split in the early 20th century, and rejected West Germany’s rearmament and the country’s integration into the Western military defense system. In 1959, however, the SPD, in the so-called “Bad Godesberg Resolution,” discarded its doctrinaire approach; nationalization of industry was dropped in favour of gradualist reform, and appeals to class warfare were abandoned. The party broadened its base to attract increasingly greater segments of the middle class. The SPD was cautious about unification, fearing that it would unleash enormous financial and emotional costs. Unlike the CDU, the SPD did not initially gain a windfall of votes in eastern Germany.

The Free Democrats

Because neither the CDU-CSU nor the SPD have generally been able to win enough votes to capture a majority of seats in the Bundestag, the balance of power has often rested with the FDP. The successor of the older German liberal parties, the FDP has generally adopted free trade, pro-business, and anticlerical positions. The party now serves as a liberal, bourgeois alternative to the CDU and SPD and often exercises a power far beyond the 6 to 10 percent support it regularly receives in national elections. For example, FDP leader Hans-Dietrich Genscher, Germany’s foreign minister from 1974 to 1992, was often viewed as the architect of German unification. In 2009 it won its best-ever electoral results—14.6 percent of the national vote—and formed a governing coalition with the ruling CDU-CSU.

The Greens

The ecologist Green Party was formed in West Germany in 1979 and merged with the eastern German Alliance ’90 in 1993. It has been the only completely new party to win national representation in the post-World War II era. Formed by mainly younger groups of environmentalists, opponents of nuclear power, and pacifists, the Greens successfully broke the 5 percent barrier in the 1983 election. On the heels of the accident at the nuclear power plant in Chernobyl, Ukraine, in 1986, the Greens captured in excess of 8 percent of the overall vote and sent 22 delegates to the Bundestag. However, internal disputes between the “realists” (Realos), who took a pragmatic approach to environmental policies, and the “fundamentalists” (Fundis), who eschewed compromise in favour of ideological purity, and dissension over individual issues weakened the cohesion of the party’s constituent factions. In 1990 the Green Party failed to surpass the 5 percent threshold. Its union with Alliance ’90 enabled it to reenter the Bundestag beginning in 1994, and from 1998 to 2005 it served as a junior partner in an SPD-led coalition. In office, the party continued to face internal dissension between the realists and fundamentalists, though the former have been dominant since the early 1990s.

The Left Party

The Left Party formed as an alliance between the PDS and the disillusioned members of the SPD and of the Green Party who had established the Electoral Alternative for Labour and Social Justice (Wahlalternative Arbeit und soziale Gerechtigkeit) in western Germany. The PDS was the successor party to East Germany’s former ruling party, the SED, which controlled the entire government apparatus until the system’s demise in 1989–90. After unification the SED lost most of its supporters and members. The PDS won 11 percent of the vote in eastern Germany in the first all-German election in 1990, giving it 17 seats in the Bundestag. During the 1990s the party gained strength in eastern Germany, where unemployment remained stubbornly high and economic conditions lagged. Although it did not surpass the 5 percent threshold in 1994, the PDS won enough constituency seats to gain Bundestag representation, and in 1998 it captured 5.1 percent of the vote, including some 20 percent in the former East German territories. The PDS largely remained a regional party, but it scored successes in eastern German states and even formed a coalition government with the SPD in Berlin in 2002. In 2002 it again failed to cross the 5 percent threshold, but in 2005 the PDS and its left allies in western Germany—together known as the Left Party—captured nearly 9 percent of the national vote and won more than 50 seats in the Bundestag. Support for the Left Party continued to grow, and in 2009 it won nearly 12 percent of the national vote and increased its number of seats in the Bundestag to 76.

Fringe parties

Of Germany’s small fringe parties, only the rightist Republican Party and the DVU, together with a handful of regional and special-interest bodies, are now visible in national or regional elections. With their tiny memberships, none of these parties has been able to surmount the 5 percent barrier in national elections. The National Democratic Party of Germany, the oldest of the country’s right-wing parties, was formed in 1964 and gained little support in national elections, though it was able to enter several state parliaments in the late 1960s. In the 1980s and ’90s, the Republicans and the DVU won seats in several state legislatures, with the Republicans’ support particularly concentrated in Bavaria, Baden-Württemberg, and Berlin. The DVU, originally formed in 1971, achieved its electoral breakthrough in the 1990s, when it won representation in Schleswig-Holstein and fared particularly well in eastern Germany, where it won 13 percent in Saxony-Anhalt’s state election in 1998. Although the rightist parties have distinct policies and have been unable to coalesce around a united platform, they share an antipathy toward Germany’s liberal immigration policies and have generally been regarded as neofascist in orientation.

Security

Germany has been a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) since May 1955. Until unification West Germany was the only NATO country with territory bordering two members of the Warsaw Pact, the Soviet bloc’s anti-Western defense alliance, and NATO strategy was founded on West Germany’s vulnerability to an armed invasion. The dissolution of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact and the admission of Poland and the Czech Republic to NATO have eased Germany away from this “frontline” status.

The German contribution to the Western defense system takes the form of its combined arm of defense known as the Federal Armed Forces (Bundeswehr). Constituting the largest contingent of NATO troops in Europe, the German military forces are divided into an army, navy, and air force. From its inception the Federal Armed Forces was envisioned as a citizens’ defense force, decisively under civilian control through the Bundestag, and its officers and soldiers trained to be mindful of the role of the military in a democracy. Conscription for males is universal, with the military liability beginning at age 18 and ending at age 32. The period of compulsory active service is nine months. Conscientious objection is guaranteed under Article 4 of the Basic Law; conscientious objectors must perform 10 months of socially useful service. After unification the exercise of conscientious objection nearly doubled. In 2010 the German government announced that it would be suspending conscription in July 2011 and adopting an all-volunteer force.

Germany maintains a separate Coast Guard and Federal Border Force. As a concession to Bavaria’s once-special position within the old German Empire, this force, although maintained by the federal government, is still known there as the Bavarian Border Patrol.

After unification the former East German People’s Army (Volksarmee) was integrated into the Federal Armed Forces. The special troops who had guarded the Berlin Wall and the boundary with West Germany, together with the factory militia, were disarmed and dissolved. At the beginning of the 21st century there was much discussion about the future of the German military, particularly regarding development of a pan-European defense force (the Eurocorps), expansion of the role of German forces in international activities (e.g., in air actions against Yugoslavia in 1999), and reorganization and downsizing of German forces.

Germany has no national police force other than the Federal Border Force, which handles emergencies outside the jurisdiction of state police forces. Law enforcement remains a province reserved to the states, and each state maintains its own police force, which is charged with all phases of enforcement, except where its function is assumed by a municipal force. In the event of a national emergency, the federal government may commandeer the services of various state police units, along with the standby police reserve that is trained and equipped by each state for action during civil emergencies.

The federal government investigates certain actions, particularly those related to the internal security of the state and crimes that transcend state boundaries. National agencies include the Munich-based Federal Intelligence Service (Bundesnachrichtendienst), which combats external threats; the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (Bundesamt für Verfassungsshutz; BfV), headquartered in Cologne, which compiles information regarding threats posed to security by domestic groups; and the Federal Criminal Investigation Office (Bundeskriminalamt), headquartered in Wiesbaden, which provides forensic and research assistance to federal and state agencies investigating crime. The BfV is particularly noteworthy for tracking the activities of extremist groups and publishing statistics annually.

The People’s Police of East Germany was dissolved upon unification, and its members were integrated into the police forces of the new states. The loathed Ministry for State Security (Ministerium für Staatssicherheit, popularly known as Stasi) was also dissolved, and its files were removed into Western custody.

Health and welfare

Germany’s system of social benefits is among the world’s most elaborate and all-embracing. A pioneer in establishing social welfare benefits, imperial Germany in the 1880s became the first country to provide health and accident insurance, workers’ and employees’ benefits and pensions, and miners’ insurance. (Under German labour law, a categorical distinction is made between hourly wage earners and salaried employees.) Ostensibly, the programs were introduced both to meet the needs of workers and to stem the influence of socialism. The German welfare system has served as a model for similar programs in other countries.

Insurance and services

By the end of the 20th century some nine-tenths of the population was covered by statutory (public) health insurance, and the country ranked among the world’s highest in terms of the proportion of health care costs covered by the government—about 90 percent of all incurred costs. Reforms in the early 21st century made health insurance compulsory for all people living in Germany. Although the vast majority of Germans remain covered by the government-sponsored health system, employees above a certain salary level or self-employed persons may decline public insurance and purchase full private insurance that is as comprehensive as the government-sponsored plans. Those participating in a government health scheme also may purchase supplemental private insurance. Contributions to government health insurance, which amount to more than one-tenth of wages or salaries, are shared by employees and employers.

Medical care in Germany is excellent, and even rural areas are well served. Hospitals are usually operated by municipalities or religious organizations or as proprietary institutions owned by one or more physicians. The conquering of tuberculosis, once endemic in Germany but now rarely encountered, was a triumph of the health system. The extensive health care system that operated in East Germany—where universal free health care, medication, child care, nursing, and pensions were funded by an obligatory state insurance system—was reorganized from the exclusive management of the system by the trade unions to alignment with the various employment, health, and retirement insurance systems of western Germany.

Accident and retirement insurance are tied to health care plans. The three major pension plans cover miners (the oldest, dating from Otto von Bismarck’s introductory social legislation), workers, and employees.

Additional benefits

Germany also provides several special systems of coverage for groups such as war widows, orphans, and farmers. Unemployment insurance is funded through deductions from wages and salaries. Allowances are made for families with one or more children. Additional public allowances are granted to persons suffering disabilities from wartime injury, whether as military personnel or as civilians. Some small indemnification has been made to property owners whose holdings lay in former German territories now outside the country.

War reparations

Under agreements concluded with 12 European countries, Germany has paid compensation to the nationals of those countries who were victims of Nazi oppression or to their families and successors. In particular, the government has assumed the immense financial responsibility of making restitution to the Jewish victims of Adolf Hitler’s Germany. Claims for property confiscated during the Third Reich have been honoured, and Jewish refugees and expellees from that era, the vast majority of whom reside abroad, have been paid indemnifications and pensions. Massive reparations have been paid to Israel in the name of the Jewish people at large. East Germany ignored all such claims until 1990, when the transition government of Lothar de Mazière undertook similar restitution. In 2000 the German government, more than 3,000 German companies, the Evangelical Church in Germany, and a number of other institutions and governments established a multibillion dollar fund to compensate those forced to perform labour during Nazi internment. These roughly one million rapidly aging people, living primarily in central and eastern Europe, were among the last large groups of victims of the Nazi era who had received no previous payments or support from Germany. The fund was intended both to provide some restitution to the forced labourers and to shield German companies from potential individual lawsuits.

Standards of living

Western Germany’s standard of living is among the highest in the world. The distribution of wealth compares favourably with that of other advanced countries. Powerful incentives to save are offered by the state not only in the form of housing subsidies and tax concessions but also through bonus saving schemes. For those whose income does not exceed a certain level, savings of up to a fixed amount kept in a bank or savings institution for six or seven years are granted a generous bonus by the government. The accumulation of capital assets is encouraged under a plan whereby workers below a certain earning level who agree to pay into a longer-term savings agreement, such as a home-savings contract, are given a “worker savings grant” by the state.

Earning power for both workers and employers assures an adequate income to meet the cost of living. There is no exaggerated difference between the compensation for blue-collar workers and white-collar employees. Although upper levels of management earn generous incomes and benefits, chief executive officers in Germany earn only six to seven times the average worker’s pay (as opposed to a vastly higher ratio in the United States). Because a major portion of tax revenue is derived from excise levies and the value-added tax—as in most EU countries—low- and medium-income workers collectively bear a greater relative tax burden.

The absorption of the eastern German population and economy had no more than a marginal effect on living standards in the regions of the western sector despite a rise in unemployment, a housing shortage, and tax increases. Even the exorbitant costs of unification, which brought about a tax increase, seemed to cause few changes in western Germany. The deutsche mark held its strength and grew even stronger. By contrast, the introduction of the mark in East Germany in July 1990—far from being the “magic bullet” hoped for—tended to have a depressing effect. The eastern population with its much lower earning power suddenly had to pay Western prices for food and other commodities. The wholesale shutdown of former state factories and enterprises caused vast unemployment in industrial cities in Thuringia, Saxony-Anhalt, and Saxony and resulted in much hardship and discontent that persisted long after unification.

During its 40 years, the East German government produced a society in which employment was guaranteed and in which most of the requirements of life were often provided free or at low cost. The demands of work were different than in West Germany and were relatively lax; competitiveness, initiative, and individuality were not qualities highly prized or rewarded. The working population was even more ill-suited than workers in Poland, Czechoslovakia, or Hungary for the plunge into a free market economy—largely because eastern German workers needed to learn new technologies, were under new management, had to accommodate the rules and culture of West German labour unions, and were forced to compete with their western German counterparts. But, unlike other former Soviet bloc countries, East Germany had a prosperous neighbour that bailed it out; as a result, in many ways eastern Germany maintained and in some ways improved its living standards.

Housing

German housing stock is generally of good quality, though there is a considerable discrepancy between eastern and western Germany. In the territory of the former West Germany, the stock is modern, some three-fourths of its dwellings having been built since the end of World War II. In contrast, eastern German housing stock is significantly older, about half of it having been built prior to the end of the war. Home ownership rates also vary considerably; more than two-fifths of dwellings are owner-occupied in western Germany and about one-third in eastern Germany. In principle, under the communist government of East Germany, every citizen and family had the right to adequate accommodations. Rents everywhere, together with charges for heating and electricity, were held at extremely low levels. The need for new housing after the war was solved by erecting massive apartment blocks of cheap material, places that are now generally out of favour with people who have the means to choose their style of housing. With the exception of a few showpieces, the great majority of urban housing constructed between 1871 and 1914 seemed to have gone unpainted or unrefurbished since before World War II. After unification, the government devoted significant resources to modernizing eastern Germany’s stock and alleviating the housing shortages caused by the extensive immigration of the 1990s.

The private sector provides most of the capital for new housing. However, the federal government’s building savings policy offers loans to those who save for a prescribed period to build or purchase a home. Much of the housing built with government subsidies is allocated to “social housing”—dwellings provided at “cost rent” far below the market rental value to families with many children, people with disabilities, the elderly, and persons with low incomes. Stringent definitions of tenants’ rights, including injunctions against arbitrary or unfair evictions and protection against precipitous rent increases, balance the rights of tenants and landlords.

The rebuilding of the cities in the 1950s and ’60s, coupled with increased automobile ownership, invariably led to the desertion of older city centres by many residents. Easier access and parking near town centres, improved public transportation, large-scale refurbishing of historic buildings, and the creation of pedestrian zones offering special entertainments, festivals, and attractions were among the attempts to reverse this trend and lure the public back downtown in the evening. Nonetheless, suburbanization has continued, particularly in eastern Germany since unification.

The physical appearance of villages and towns throughout western Germany was improved on a grand scale beginning in the 1970s through extensive renovation programs undertaken by the states; grants, subsidies, and matching funds were made available to restore the exteriors of historic monuments and older buildings to pristine condition. The process also occurred in eastern Germany after unification.

Education

Preschool, elementary, and secondary

Schooling is free and compulsory for children age 6 to 18. Although the control of education rests with the states, there is a national commission that strives for uniformity of curriculum, requirements, and standards. Some books and study materials are free, and financial assistance and other forms of support are available in cases of hardship.

Preschooling, to which the notably German contribution in modern times is enshrined in the universal word kindergarten, can begin at 3 years of age. Some four-fifths of children attend kindergarten. All children attend the Grundschule (“basic school”) from age 6 until about age 10. Somewhat less than half continue elementary schooling in a junior secondary school called the Hauptschule (“head school”) until about age 15 or 16. Afterward students are assigned to a Berufsschule (“vocational school”) that they attend part-time in conjunction with an apprenticeship or other on-the-job training. This program makes it possible for virtually every young person in the vocational track to learn a useful skill or trade, constantly adapted to the actual demands of the employment market.

Children who receive a commercial or clerical education, somewhat less than one-third of the school-age population, attend an intermediate school called the Realschule (roughly meaning practical school) and earn an intermediate-level certificate that entitles them to enter a Fachschule (“technical” or “special-training school”), the completion of which is a prerequisite for careers in the middle levels of business, administration, and the civil service.

Approximately one-third of all children are chosen to study at a Gymnasium (senior secondary school, equivalent to a grammar school in the United Kingdom), in which a rigorous program lasting for nine years (levels 5 to 13) prepares them—with emphasis variously on the classics, modern languages, mathematics, and natural science—for the Abitur or Reifezeugnis (“certificate of maturity”), the prerequisite for matriculation at a German university. The traditional structure of the German Gymnasium has mainly shifted from being built around a single branch of studies to offering a “reformed upper phase” with a choice of courses.

Many so-called Gesamtschulen (equivalent to British comprehensive schools), which were established beginning in the 1960s, are now operated in each state, though conservative areas were generally resistant to them. These Gesamtschulen are intended as an alternative to the previously rigid division into three levels, often criticized for forcing the choice of a child’s future at too early an age, a choice that, once entered upon, was almost impossible to change. These schools offer a large range of choices and permit pupils more freedom in seeking the level best suited for them.

Higher education

German universities, famed in history and noted for their enormous contributions to learning, especially in the 19th and early 20th centuries, have been severely strained by the swelling numbers of students and changing social conditions that have taxed the traditional structures of the universities beyond their capacities or accustomed functions. Today it has become all but impossible for students to take as long as they wish to complete their studies or to move from university to university. Lecture rooms, seminars, and libraries are greatly overburdened. In response, a small number of specialized private universities were founded, and there has been considerable debate about the financing of education, particularly whether tuition charges should be introduced.

To meet the rapidly rising demand for higher education, the number of universities also has increased. Entirely new academic universities have been added to the ranks of the ancient institutions, and the status of institutes and colleges of technology, education, and art have been upgraded to university rank. At the same time, new specialized or technical institutions such as the Fachhochschule, a higher technical college specializing in a single discipline, such as engineering, architecture, design, art, agriculture, or business administration, have been created. Little difference in prestige is attached to whether a student has studied at Heidelberg, founded in 1386, or at the multimedia university at Hagen, Westphalia, established in 1976, where teaching is largely by correspondence through regional study centres. Among Germany’s leading universities are the Humboldt University of Berlin (founded 1809–10), the Free University of Berlin (founded 1948), the University of Cologne (founded 1388), the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University of Frankfurt (founded 1914), the University of Göttingen (founded 1737), the University of Leipzig (founded 1409), and the University of Tübingen (founded 1477). At the beginning of the 21st century Germany had more than 300 universities or institutions of equivalent rank (about half of which were Fachhochschule).

The rough equivalent of a bachelor’s degree is a Diplom, though some consider the degree a closer equivalent to the American master’s degree. A fairly large number of students also earn degrees in education (by way of the Lehramtspruefung) and in technical schools. A small number of institutions have begun offering an American-style bachelor’s degree.

There is an extensive range of possibilities for extended education or extramural studies. About 1,000 Volkshochschulen (adult education centres) enroll some six million adults for complete courses or individual subjects, whether in preparation for or furtherance of a career or out of personal interest. The government has also promoted the retraining and further vocational education of workers.

Problems of transition

Integration of the former East German educational system brought a host of problems. As the focus of education was to inculcate the values of the communist state, even textbooks and some school materials were unsuitable for the educational aims of united Germany. English replaced Russian as the primary foreign language taught, forcing unemployment for untold numbers of Russian teachers and creating a shortage of qualified English teachers. The reorientation of primary and secondary schoolteachers to the standards and aims of the republic became an important concern and a focus of retraining.

At the university level the issue of competence became acute. Since many of the faculty of East Germany’s universities had been appointed based on their soundness in Marxism-Leninism or loyalty to the SED, upon unification their qualifications became obsolete. The federal authority for qualifying universities to confer degrees and diplomas were unable to give recognition to some institutions of university rank, while the ministers of education of the new states were subjected to great pressures to reconfirm existing appointments. Reappointment committees staffed largely by western Germans reassessed the qualifications of eastern faculty. These committees failed to rehire many easterners, and institutions in eastern Germany were flooded with westerners. Whereas the former East German research institutions had generally been separate from universities, the western system combining research and teaching was implemented nationally following unification.